Men's Tennis Defeated Brown 6-1

Thursday, March 26

Boca Raton, Fla.

2:00 PM

Florida Atlantic

Brown

3/27/2009 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis

March 26, 2009

BOCA RATON, FL - Florida Atlantic University's men's tennis team celebrated the four-year collegiate career of Eddie Majcher who played his final home match as an Owl Thursday afternoon. Majcher led the Owls to a 6-1 victory over Brown University. The victory gave the Owls an 8-1 home record.

The Owls (13-6) won the battle of the hard fought match but the train got rolling on doubles court three. FAU's Lawrence Harradine and Santiago Nieto executed relentless fundamentals in an 8-2 win. The duo of Daniel Vardag and Joshua Scholl finished shortly after with an emphatic 8-5 victory to clinch the doubles point. Court one remained with the FAU's nationally ranked team (no. 63) of senior Eddie Majcher and Marc Abdelnour to fighting for the match. The Bears would prevail however in a tie break 7-4.

Brown used that doubles match win, despite dropping the point to carry over into singles play. "Coach Harris does a terrific job cultivating team chemistry," said FAU Head Coach Brandon Stokes. "The Bears put forth their best effort all day on every court. This was a good match symbolizing what makes college tennis the best sport in the world."

The teams would split the first sets on six courts. Brown quickly won on court one, court three, and court six. The Owls would persevere with longer first set victories on courts two, four, and six. The second sets would flip results on every court. All six courts went three sets.

FAU would get on the singles board first. Lawrence Harradine won nine straight games to clinch FAU's second team point 2-6, 6-3, 6-0. The match was so physical that his opponent Noah Gardner became ill between the second and third sets. FAU had the momentum back. Three minutes later Santiago won an inspired match on court six 2-6, 6-3, 6-2. The decisive point came at 5:23 p.m. as Marc Abdelnour clinched with a volley winner at No. 1 singles 2-6, 6-1, 6-2.

Court two would now play a match tie break in lieu of a complete third set since the team match had been decided. Daniel Vardag stretched the lead to 5-0 on "Senior Day" with a 7-6 (6), 5-7, 12-10 victory. Court four was captured by Brown's Sam Garland 4-6, 7-6 (4), 6-4. One break of serve was the difference for the victor.

All eyes then turned to court six where FAU's lone senior would conclude his final match with all of his teammates and fans cheering him on. Eddie Majcher would demonstrate preparation and will. After surrendering an early break in the final set he battled his way to break point. However, the Kendrick Au took an injury timeout for a lower body cramp. Majcher immediately broke. But Kendrick broke back. Majcher's pressure and the Florida climate were too formidable. Majcher broke serve at love to win 6-4 in his final home match for FAU.

"We learned a tremendous amount about ourselves and college tennis yesterday by competing against national power Ole Miss," said Stokes. "The team took those lessons to heart and came out today and applied what they learned. The past 48 hours was a tough challenge intended to get us ready for the Sun Belt Conference matches next weekend and for the Conference tournament in a few weeks."